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Owing to having too much to do, I haven't submitted a ballot since 1990. I'm going to submit a preliminary for 2001, since for the foreseeable future I'll have most of my free time back.

I left you as an extreme peak voter, but return with a different perspective. I now look for quantity of what you could call +5 WARP3 seasons. Using these, I establish a prime for the player in question, and then rank them according to the height of this prime. I also have relaxed my previous strict positional balance policy, but still apply one. Comparisons to people already in the HoM also are a factor. I also prefer, where possible, to measure ability against position as opposed to the entire league. I have also introduced a 'minimum career length' guideline. The numbers after each player's name are the number of WARP3 5+ seasons they have, and the WARP3 value of their prime. The letter code after each player's entry shows how I would vote for them in a 'yes/no' binary system like a real HoF ballot.

At this stage, I'm still a bit wary about how I've ranked pitchers, and am currently looking to revise this after some more research, but I'm sufficiently comfortable with the rest of my ballot.

1 Lou Whitaker (17 124,1 ) I think it's a shame he hasn't won election to the HoF, but I'm not sure he could said to have been the best 2b in the league during his prime. (N)

2 Dave Winfield (15 122,2) Was he arguably the best rightfielder in baseball during his lengthy prime? I think so. That's the standard all HoFers must attain. (Y)

3 Willie Randolph (15 100,1) Not as 'peaky' as Whitaker, nor as valuable over career. (N)

4 Tony Perez (12 91,9) He's not a good enough 1b to shove his way into an 'elect me' position, and I wouldn't vote him into the HoF either. (N)

5 Kirby Puckett (12 95,8) Should he be at 4? Taken down a peg for a short career. But he's a remarkably strong performer when he does play. (N)

6 Bob Johnson (12 93,7) He also suffers from a short career when making comparisons. Initially, I had him ranked ahead of Puckett, and may return to that. (N)

7 Dave Stieb (9 74,3) I'm really not sure about this one. I tend to give a bonus to the 'non-hitting' positions since I think they are undervalued by One Big Number systems. However, I'm still looking at pitchers, as I said. Stieb may drop down the ballot a bit. (N)

9 Phil Rizzuto (8, 75,6) Pushed up the ballot owing to War credit (I posted some stats on the Rizzuto thread where I used Brock2 to make an estimate. I'm fairly confident, though, he belongs behind Traynor. But should he be ahead of Stieb? (N)

[NB. I have Stieb, Traynor and Rizzuto of almost equivalent merit overall, so any movement up or down is going to see these move en bloc.]

10 Thurman Munson (9 59,5) In overall value, Munson and Parrish are almost identical. However, Munson has more Prime value, so consequently wins the place on the ballot. As a side note, I don't see how one can vote for Freehan in an elect-me spot, and not for Munson further down the ballot. The statistics show them to be near identical in performance during their primes. (N)

11 Bill Mazeroski (11 93,7) One day, when someone writes "The Politics of Merit", Bill Mazeroski is going to be exhibit No. 1 in any case assembled against the HoM electorate. The fact that he hardly gets any votes at all is damning. The only reason he is this low on my ballot is because of my positional balance policy, and even then his case is strong enough to make me add a third 2b when normally I'd restrict it to two. Expect to see him in an 'elect me' slot at some point. (Y)

12 Alejandro Oms The best Negro Leaguer outside the HoM? I'm not sure exactly where to put him. He's associated in my mind with the Stieb-Traynor-Rizzuto bloc at the moment, so he's definitely behind Maz. (N)

13 George Van Haltren (12 81,1) Van Haltren is the archetype of a sort of player who did badly with me before, and better now. He's got 12 seasons of +5 WARP3 performance, but overall doesn't have a high peak. Now his consistency shows up better. (N)

14 Dave Bancroft (10, 77.6) No one else so far makes an exceptionally strong case, but just looking at WARP3 numbers, I like Bancroft's better than some. (Maranville, I'm looking at you.) (N)

<u>Mandatory Mentions</u>Cannonball Dick Redding He's closer to my ballot than before, and may do better with my second take of the pitchers.Pete Browning, Roger Bresnahan and Charley Jones: All of them have primes that are too short to crack my ballot - Browning and Bresnahan 6, Jones 7. I don't see how even with extra credit I can advance Jones beyond 9 seasons.

<u>Newcomers</u>Don Mattingly: Mattingly has only nine +5 WARP3 seasons, much too few for a 1b.Lance Parrish: I identify him as Munson with a decline phase but not quite as high a prime. It's the latter that means he is falling just short.

Dr. Chaleeko--thanks very much for the strong praise! Of course I make use of EqBR because I have it, but I would note that the impact of non-SB baserunning is rather small...here is the standard deviation, in wins above average per 162 games, of the various position player abilities from 1972-2005. (The defensive numbers are courtesy of Chris Dial's Zone Rating data).

So as you can see, EqBR are fairly small potatoes...particularly since the SB/CS distribution has a fat right tail (with guys like Henderson, Raines etc.) for whom it does make a big difference, while EqBR is much more normal and centered around 0 (as is DP avoidance). Nonetheless, if you take guys who were good basestealers AND non-SB baserunners AND stayed out of double plays AND played good defense, then it can really add up. Guys like Willie Wilson (and Campaneris himself) leap to mind here.

Mark Shirk--I agree, I credit him at below his top peak level, and that's why he's down-ballot rather than near the top. I also like shortstops more than just about anyone else on this board.

The Ryan-Gossage-Fingers election has given the post-WW II years their first three 40+ HOMer seasons (minimum 10 G or equivalent). Tony Perez seeks to join the crowd of 1972-74, while Dave Winfield is almost sure to add to the 1973-74 tally. And 1975 could jump from 39 to 42 with Winfield-Randolph-Perez elections.

To me it's less the amount of credit that ends up accruing to a player for baserunning, but the fact that you make the attempt to credit them for it. Baserunning is virtually neglected, but is one of the three major facets of the game. And as PBP goes back in time, I suspect it will become much, much more important. Baseball was once a fielding and running game, after all. So I just think seeing the whole player and how whole players create value is a good thing. I hope baserunning becomes a part of all uberstat evaluations since the pbp is rapidly becoming available and parsable.

Dave Winfield: I pretty much said everything in his thread. He's among the 10 most entertaining palyers I've ever watched.

Lou Whitaker: He had one of the strangest career transformations you can imagine. At first he's a light-hitting, good-fielding keystone man who plays every day. As time moves along, he becomes a power-hitting, so-so fielding keystone man who plays every day a lefty isn't out there. This is how he became one of the few guys who actually increased his career OPS+ over his last several seasons.

Kirby Puckett: As much as he was all smiles and seemed to be a wonderful community presence, I guess I can't help but look at Puckett as a tragic figure. After His early death after rapid weight gain, his post-career problems, and his end-of-career eye troubles, he seems a lot more like a well-rounded character (a human being) than the one-dimensional good-doer we thought we knew.

Don Mattingly: My favorite player growing up, bar none. I was a right-handed first baseman in Little League (oops, not much room for me on the old defensive spectrum!), and I was in suburban NY. I had the luxury of choosing from two amazing 1Bs, but I was a Yankee fan first. I was a Kevin Youkilis who couldn't pull, but I always wanted to be Don Mattingly. Best Mattingly in-game memory. I went to maybe a dozen games that Mattingly played in. At the first 11 (or however many) he didn't do much, to my great disappointment. But in the last one, August 15th, 1993, he did. I was watching with an Orioles fan who was a friend of mine. Scott Kamienicki went for NY against BAL, and he was in the midst of a long streak of winning at the Stadium. In fact, this was the day after Reggie Jackson day, the game where Domingo Jean ran from the GWB to the STadium due to traffic. Anyway, Kamienicki tossed a gem, trading blanks with Ben McDonald for 8 innings. In the bottom of the 8th, Mattingly led off with a high liner to right field. McLemore leapt at the fence, but couldn't make the catch: home run!!! The Yankees made it stand up in the ninth, and I got the thrill of my relatively young baseball life. [disclaimer: McLemore may have been interfered with, as I recollect the ball going into or ticking off his glove, but fans were right on him trying to keep him away from the ball. It was that close.] Great game, great memory.

Lance Parrish: Parrish, Trammell, and Whitaker are the best players from the 1980s Tigers that won so many games. Yet they are the ones who don't get enough love from the writers in any award vote. Kirk Gibson got an eventual MVP for a season not all that different from some with Detroit, G. Hernandez got the Cy Young/MVP, Sparky got the Hall, and Morris has pretty good support in the Hall votes. Some things don't add up, and Parrish, Trammell, and Whitaker have gotten pretty well hosed by the BBWAA.

Andy Van Slyke: Funny man, great player for a short while, too bad, like Mattingly, his back didn't hold up. Terrible L/R splits: 846 OPS versus righties, 669 v. lefties. Even in his excellent 1988 season, 1005/558, and 22 HR vs RHP, 3 vs. LHP. 904/626 in 1991. Anyway, the decision to ink Slick to a long-term deal and not Bonds has haunted the Pirates ever since, and it begins the trail of misery that leads us to the McClatchy/Littlefield Disaster.

Kirk Gibson: Kirk Gibson probably had the ugliest swing I've ever seen. He so blocky, no grace or fluidity at all. His front foot stopmed more than strode. He often seemed off balance. His kind of jerked across his waist rather than sweeping through the zone in any kind of arc. I might be wrong, but I remember him grimacing a lot. When he was fooled, he looked absolutely awful, manifestly worse than anyone else, because he didn't have the decency to be comic like Winfield. I never understood how such a gifted athlete could look so ungraceful in his chosen sport. But I did appreciate that he didn't shave.

Howard Johnson: A favorite of mine from the Davey Mets. He had this funny way of moving his hands before the pitch, making little circles in the air, just below the letters. As if the bat were a giant spyrograph, and the pencil stuck out of the bottom of his hands. Living in NY at that time, all the attention was on what an awful 3B HoJo was. Indeed, FRAA shows he was terrible, racking up plenty of double-digit negatives. In a way, he was Chipper Jones v. 1.0: lots of power, lots of walks, rotten glove, plenty of athleticism. In fact, if you look at his BP translated stats for his 5-year peak of 1987-1991, they look like Chipper years with about 30 points less batting average. He was perhaps the best player in the NL not named Clark in this period, and then the wheels came off. I remember a shoulder injury of some sort, but I was never sure if that was the only problem. He lost about 50-100 points of ISO overnight plus 30 points of AVG. They never came back. He tried the OF, and it was a bust. Then he was gone. Too bad, I liked him.

Dave Stewart: So what's up with Dave Stewart's post-baseball career? First he's in the F.O. in Toronto, then he's out and can't get an MLB job and whining about it. Then he's kind-of a player-agent or something. Then he's giving interviews about bad lockerroom incidnets. What's going on here?

Tom Henke: Great, great reliever. Went out on top. Wished he'd stuck around longer...the Phils could have used him.

Mike Moore: This year is Stewart and Moore. Last year we had Welch. I'm sure Sanderson's around the corner. How about Storm Davis? Somehow Bill Gullickson isn't in this group, though it seems like he should be. Maybe if Carlton had gone to Oakland instead of Cleveland, Minny, Chicago.... Hey, has anyone seen his new movie, Sicko?

Dave Righetti: Righetti always seemed frightfully human to me. Like he was always teetering a bit on an edge of anxiety. My clearest memory of him: he came into a game with men on and the Yanks ahead. The hitter promptly blasted one out to give the bad guys the lead. Rags got the new ball from the ump, turned, and fired it over the outfield fence in frustration. Does anyone remember which year this was or against what team? I thought it was Toronto, and I thought it was late in the year, but rsheet doesn't show any game that would fit the bill. I might be confusing the opponent with Toronto because Toronto may have been the team the Yanks were chasing. I remember it being a day game, but I'm not 100% sure.

Dimino, you've got to remember this, right?

John Kruk: In the mid 1990s he was a favorite, once I moved to Philadelphia, but nowadays, he's not quite as favoritish. Just dumb. Even before I was in the SABRmetric camp, I marveled that the 1993 Phils had like 20 guys who drew 100 walks; they led the next best NL team in walks by 100. This was the team that helped me understand the importance of OBP, and I've long suspected that they, in fact, helped a lot of other teams understand it too. They Yanks soon began hoarding good obp guys, and they won it all in 1996 using a formula not to dissimilar to the 1993 Phils. An amazing fact: Kruk stole 58 bases in his career, including 18 in one year.

Scott Fletcher: I don't really remember him playing, what I remember was that he signed a "big" FA contract one year, and the whole baseball world was aghast at the cost. They were right, he wasn't worth it.

Jose Rijo: Great story. Actually, a great pitcher. The sad part here is that he really was a dominator. The seasons leading up to his surgery were uniformly excellent. If not for Greg Maddux he might have been the best pitcher in the NL leading up to the strike.

Steve Bedrosian: He's the only man with an Armenian name to receive a major baseball award. My wife, the Armenian, wanted me to mention this.

Ron Darling: One year I distinctly remember Darling going through a long stretch of no-decisions. I remember it because all the NY media reported on it as if this were a matter of great importance. Yet, looking back on Retrosheet, the longest such streak I can find was five in a row at the tail end of 1990. He otherwise had no streak longer than three. I wondered if this 20-year-old memory was wrong. Sure enough it was. In 1987, Darling went fourteen starts without a win, not without a decision. 0-6, 84 IP, 76 H, 4.84 ERA, 68 K, 44 BB. Doesn't look awful, especially by 1987 standards, but... he allowed 15 homers in this span. Ouch! I wonder if he didn't adjust well to the rabbit ball.

The other thing that sticks out about Darling is that I remember hearing that in the offseason, he stayed in shape by running the beaches of his native Hawaii. To develop a better grip for his forkball/splitter, he ran with a softball wedged between his fingers.

Which reminds me of one other trivial tidbit: He and rotationmate Sid Fernandez were both born in Hawaii. They are the longest-lasting pair of Hawaiian teammates. Here's the list I was able to put together of such pairings:
-Mike Lum-Doug Capilla (78-79 reds)
-Lum-Capilla (81 cubs)
-Carlos Diaz-Ron Darling (83 mets)
-Darling-Sid Fernandez (84-91 mets)
-Charlie Hough-Mike Huff (91-92 chw)
-Villapuerte-Victorino (2003 sdp)

101. fra paolo Posted: June 30, 2007 at 12:40 PM (#2423818). . .
I have also introduced a 'minimum career length' guideline. The numbers after each player's name are the number of WARP3 5+ seasons they have, and the WARP3 value of their prime. The letter code after each player's entry shows how I would vote for them in a 'yes/no' binary system like a real HoF ballot.
. . .
Mandatory Mentions
Cannonball Dick Redding He's closer to my ballot than before, and may do better with my second take of the pitchers.
Pete Browning, Roger Bresnahan and Charley Jones: All of them have primes that are too short to crack my ballot - Browning and Bresnahan 6, Jones 7. I don't see how even with extra credit I can advance Jones beyond 9 seasons.
[That is 1877-1885.]

You would need to dissent from WARP3's "conservative" adjustment for the length of the season. I think that comes naturally if the point is to ensure some minimum calendar length of a ballplayer's prime. In the four seasons you exclude, '75-76 and '86-87, Jones put up EqA .303-.315 and .297-.298/.248. That is below every season you include, EqA .316-.353, but it is very good. I suspect he was in his prime for baseball skills from 1875 to mid-1887 (a remarkable split season, two clubs and two qualities). Maybe I can show that for 1875 before the decade is out.

Regarding the count of "5+ WARP3 seasons" and the length of the season:
Charley Jones surpassed 5+ per 162 games in both 1876 and 1886. The Davenport Translations inflate short historical seasons by the factor (162/S)^(2/3) where S is the length of the season in games. Team games played or games scheduled? The distinction pertains beginning 1877, when the league first set a schedule, if not earlier, when contending teams were supposed to meet a set number of times (1876 and ??).

Anyway, the DT factor is short of the linear factor 162/S in proportion (S/162)^(1/3), the cube root of S/162 [less than one]. In order to use the 162-game rate instead, multiply by (162/S)^(1/3) [greater than one].

For the 140-game schedule of 1886 (when Jones played only 90%) the difference is small. The correction factor greater than one is only 1.05 --but that is enough to boost Jones from 4.8 to 5+. (Davenport inflates the 140-game WARP2[?] by 1/10 where linear inflation would be about 1/7.)

For the 70-game schedule of 1876 (when Jones played 64 of 65 team games) the difference is big. The correction factor is 1.323 using 70 games, the number teams were required to play, or 1.356 using 65 games, the number Cincinnati played (as the teams from New York and Philly canceled their closing Western trips). This is much more than enough to boost Jones from 4.3 to 5+.

Don Mattingly: My favorite player growing up, bar none. I was a right-handed first baseman in Little League (oops, not much room for me on the old defensive spectrum!), and I was in suburban NY. I had the luxury of choosing from two amazing 1Bs, but I was a Yankee fan first. I was a Kevin Youkilis who couldn't pull,

If Enos Cabell could say that.

but I always wanted to be Don Mattingly. Best Mattingly in-game memory. I went to maybe a dozen games that Mattingly played in. At the first 11 (or however many) he didn't do much, to my great disappointment. But in the last one, August 15th, 1993, he did. I was watching with an Orioles fan who was a friend of mine. Scott Kamienicki went for NY against BAL, and he was in the midst of a long streak of winning at the Stadium. In fact, this was the day after Reggie Jackson day, the game where Domingo Jean ran from the GWB to the STadium due to traffic.

not Pascual Perez? or Melido Perez?

Steve Bedrosian: He's the only man with an Armenian name to receive a major baseball award. My wife, the Armenian, wanted me to mention this.

I moved to Watertown two years later. (How often do you and your wife come here, EC?) My landlords, the Bedrossians, knew only one thing about baseball.

I remember in 1986 the big argument among Mets fans was HoJo or Ray Knight at 3B. I was a HoJo guy (although knowing me it was probably just because my best friend was a Knight fan.), so the next few years were a lot of fun. My favorite HoJo story was when the Cardinals accused him of corking his bat, so he left a bat in the clubhouse in St. Louis with a hole bunch of corks glued to it. (Ah, baseball humor.) And his fielding produced a lot of good lines from wise guys in the press. From Baseball's Even Greater Insults:

"The Mets will have 21 givewaway dates this season, not counting games Howard Johnson starts at third base" - Spy Magazine

After Vada Pinson gave a tip on how to play center to the less than graceful Howard Johnson, Tom Boswell wondered if the tip was "Wear a crash helmet."

And in Neyer's Lineups book, he made the Mets Iron Glove team at 3B and CF, with the latter being summarized as "disaster of biblical scale".

I moved to Watertown two years later. (How often do you and your wife come here, EC?)

We're only there when the real Armenian oldsters in the family pass away, so once every few years. Then it's off to the Armenian Orthodox church up the road from the (delicious) Sevan Bakery. Same sermon every time, and I wish they'd mix in some new metaphors so the agrieved family might get a little sense of the sermon being customized to the life of the deceased. Anyway, after the burial, it's back to the fellowship hall for an amazing Armenian meal. I mostly go for the meal; the pilaf and Armenian Green Beans are the spiritual part of the experience for me (since I don't usually know the deceased). If you've never eaten Armenian, it's a very hearty, yummy cuisine with lots of Greek/Lebanese qualities to it. And then a quick trip to Sevan to wonder at the Armenian victuals (kufta and chorigs [sp?]), have a little lemigen (sp?), and waddle out of Watertown stuffed like piggies.

No, no. But those are family occasions so you won't drop in. I know all those places, plus the museum in Watertown Square where I get the buses. Mainly in the 1990s, I have played in dozens of Eastern Massachusetts bridge tournaments at the cultural center on Nichols Ave (fellowship hall?). The Sunday night janitor liked me because I picked up junk from a dozen tables instead of one.

lahmajeune, at least that's closer. But it's translated from another alphabet, right?

No 1920s OFs are still in the mix.
Looongshot Elston Howard was an OF-C in 1957.
Loongshot Lou Brock was an OF in 1963.
1939-40 have 12, and contender Bob Johnson.
1968 has 12, plus varying longshots Brock, ReSmith, and BoBonds qualify.

So what's the next likely group to challenged Howie's mark in post #113?

Of course it depends on many things, but this core group is together a lonnnng time:

Clemens, Maddux, Glavine, Smoltz, Johnson, Pedro, Rivera. Rivera's the youngest, and he kicks off in 1996 or so. 7.

Now tack onto them some or all of the following group:

Schilling, Hoffman, Brown, Mussina. There's 4 more.

Brown's the one with the earliest departure, and 2003 is his latest qualifying season. All these guys are around in 2003. And so are a few guys in a tertiary pool of veteran pitchers who might merit consideration:

Wagner, Franco, Pettitte.

Finally, there's a group of younger pitchers who we can't say for sure about yet, but any of whom could prove HOMable, so that even if Brown doesn't make it (and we can look forward from 2003), there's plenty of possibilities:

Looking at a couple other positions in terms of breaking established records for most HOMers in a year, but not doing any of the work to see whether these guys actually played the position in question....

Catcher: Parrish, Fisk, Carter, I-Rod were all in the league in 1991 and 1992. Piazza was there in 1992, but played only 21 games. In our current day, candidates Piazza, I-Rod, Posada, Mauer, and V. Martinez are all active. Something about closeness and cigars.

1B: McGwire, Palmeiro, Thomas, Bagwell, Murray, Will Clark, Jason Giambi, and Jim Thome were all active at the same time. If they all make it, it's a tie with the FGG bunch Howie Mentions.

2B: Biggio, Alomar, Sandberg, Kent, Whitaker could tie the three 5 spots in howie's list. So too could Biggio, Alomar, Sandberg, Whitaker, and Randolph in the late 80s-early 90s.

3B: Maybe Brett, Boggs, Molitor, Evans, Schmidt could tie for the five actives at once some time in the 1980s? How about C. Jones, Rolen, M. Cabrera, Wright, and A-Rod to tie?

SS: How about Jeter, A-Rod, Larkin, Ripken, Ozzie, Trammell in 1996? If this was the HOF, we could tack Omar on....

OF: Best reasonable group I can get is 12 in the late 1980s, early 1990s: Bonds, Rickey, Raines, Griffey, Sheffield, Gwynn, Manny, Winfield, Sosa, Belle, Dawson, Puckett, and there's lots of if in this bunch either by position or electability. Another possibility that's more forward looking and more speculative is a hodge podge consisting of some or all members of this group: Griffey, Bonds, Sheffield, Manny, Sosa, A. Jones, C. Jones (in his LF years), Beltran, Sizemore, Ichiro (with Japan play), Matsui (with Japan play), Berkman, Guerrero, Abreu, Giles, Crawford, Damon, Edmonds, Bernie, M. Cabrera.

I like the new fra paulo system better than what I remember of the previous system. I think the binary part should be tossed. The only adjustment I might make is using WARP1 instead of WARP3 to avoid timelining half of baseball history out of contention. How would that impact the ballot?

I don't generally know enough about year to year details to see the criterion. Are the "major" career playing dates gleaned from HOM plaques and/or MLE tables for the particular players (Campanella, Johnson, Lloyd)?

FWIW the Nebraska/Bison edition of Sol White's book includes five Philadelphia Giants box scores for 1907 --in "History of Colored Base-Ball During 1907" by White. Lloyd is the short-stop in all five, four championship games and a 1-0, 11-inning win over Hoboken.

In the table, career share by fielding position, do you use MLE tables developed here?

Well, DLdellaMN, I guess if I'd changed it to putting PHoF after Winfield and Mazeroski and leaving the rest blank, you probably wouldn't have batted an eye.

I'm not sure about the timelining comment. As I understand it, WARP3 is adjusted to balance all eras, like Win Shares, while WARP1 is specific to a season. I can see looking for +5 WARP1 instead of WARP3 seasons, and I've already looked at my top 3 and made some interesting discoveries; but I'm not so comfortable about comparing, for example, Traynor's and Bando's primes using WARP1 instead of WARP3. What's the timelining effect that would come into play?

Beside any adjustments for league quality (which are in WARP1-->WARP2, I think), Davenport Translation gives Charley Jones and others credit for the 1876 season at their rates per 120 games or so. The "correction" factor 1.323 or 1.356 (mentioned above) converts that to credit at 162-game rates.

OK.
Strictly one might say timelining is literally using dates as a proxy for (increasing) quality of play. Strictly, then, none of the WARP ratings includes a timeline. Davenport has a precise measure of relative quality of play for each league-season in the majors from 1871.

Here we all used the term loosely, but loose in different ways. Better medical care, etc, are kinds of progress that we living in the 21st century take for granted and they have an important place in arguments about timelining.

As I understand it, WARP3 is adjusted to balance all eras, like Win Shares, while WARP1 is specific to a season.

Win Shares are measured in the context of a particular league-season, like WARP1.
WARP2, and ipso facto WARP3, includes an adjustment for differences in quality of play. I wouldn't say "to balance all eras". The point is that a Win (ARP) in a stronger league is worth more than a Win in a weaker league; for example, a win in NL 1997 is worth more than a win in AL 1944 is worth more than a win in NL 1891 is worth more than a win in AA 1891. WARP2 inflates and deflates the wins measured by WARP1 in proportion to the measured quality differences. Then WARP3 inflates the wins measured for seasons shorter than 162 games, in less than proportion to 162/S.

Yes but, for example, the fielding constants used to assign Fielding Win Shares are the same for all eras aren't they? And isn't the RC formula identical in so far as the stats available allow? I'm not clear that Win Shares measures league quality, either, the way Davenport Translations purport to do.

Having thought about it some more, I don't see the point of going back to WARP1, since that omits the league difficulty calculation, which as today's AL/NL imbalance shows, can be significant.

I'm not particularly attached to WARP3, but I like it better than Win Shares, since it appears to be based on a linear weights formula.

> Win Shares are measured in the context of a particular league-season

Yes but, for example, the fielding constants used to assign Fielding Win Shares are the same for all eras aren't they? And isn't the RC formula identical in so far as the stats available allow? I'm not clear that Win Shares measures league quality, either, the way Davenport Translations purport to do.

Win Shares does not incorporate any measure of league quality. That is what I mean in writing "Win Shares is measured in the context of a particular league-season, like WARP1." A win share is a win share is a win share. Fielding constants, etc, bear on whether the measure is accurate, or for what times it is more or less accurate.

Dave Stewart: So what's up with Dave Stewart's post-baseball career? First he's in the F.O. in Toronto, then he's out and can't get an MLB job and whining about it. Then he's kind-of a player-agent or something. Then he's giving interviews about bad lockerroom incidnets. What's going on here?

Just wanted to mention that about a week ago, I was sitting about 12 feet from Stewart, his wife/girlfriend, and their son at the local AA game. He wasn't wearing a World Series ring, and not too many people recognized him. Not sure why he was there, but he showed up the next night near the very end of the game...

Dave Stewart: So what's up with Dave Stewart's post-baseball career? First he's in the F.O. in Toronto, then he's out and can't get an MLB job and whining about it. Then he's kind-of a player-agent or something. Then he's giving interviews about bad lockerroom incidnets. What's going on here?

Dave Stewart was assistant GM in Toronto during the Gord Ash era. I remember some complaints that the reason he couldn't get a full GM position was due to race. I seem to remember that was especially prevalent when he lost out on the Toronto job to JP Ricciardi after Ash was fired. However, if you look at the Gord Ash era, there's no question that Dave Stewart was not the man for the job. Ash made a ton of questionable trades including trading everyday players for middle relievers, trading for a bunch of young pitchers who didn't work out (Mike Sirotka, Luke Prokopec) and several in which he shipped away young pitchers who went on to work out for other teams (specifically Chris Carpenter). Stewart was assistant GM at the time and you'd think that as someone who specializes in pitching, he had some input on those decisions. Those decisions demonstrate that Ash or Stewart or both were not very good judges of young pitching talent. As a Toronto fan, I'm glad that Stewart didn't get the job. Since then, he's worked as a pitching coach but has had trouble keeping that kind of job as well (I haven't paid enough attention to know if it's because he isn't good at it or because he feels it's a step down from an assistant GM job).

re Post 132:
It's pretty much spitballing at this point. Generally I read through our MLE and other estimates listed in the Negro League player's particular thread. Thr rough criteria is playing/starting half a team's games as a hitter, being in a regular rotation (1 IP per team g) as a pitcher.

That makes 1907 a close call, and I'd be willing to add Lloyd to the '1907 SS' list.Actually I'd be willing to make any add that we think is sensible.

In the "pct of games played by position" lists, I round off to the nearest 5. So if it looks like a player was about two-thirds SS and one-third 2B, I make it "65-35."
It felt like "67-33" might imply a precision we'll never have compared to major leaguers.

I intend to fine-tune and doublecheck these by year's end.

................

re 134: Yes, I could have listed Oms there.
..........

re 136:
1975 has Morgan, Carew, and Grich. Randolph isn't a regular til 1976, Whitaker doesn't kick in til 1978. Carew departs there after 1975. No current also-ranners of note to help either.

in case my quistion wasn't clear how come you would put Winfield and Mazoroski in the HoF but players who are higher then them on the ballot you didn't put in?

David Foss has summed it up nicely.

There are three factors at work here. One is that the Hall of Merit ballot is different to the Hall of Fame ballot. A HoM ballot isn't asking me 'do you think there are three candidates of HoM quality to elect this year?' It's just asking me how I would rank the top 15 of those eligible to be elected. It's possible I think none of them are worthy of induction, but the ballot doesn't accommodate that, except through non-participation, which doesn't really have any effect.

The second is that the Hall of Merit Constitution rudely demands that I vote for players on the basis of the value of their on-field performance. So I have to choose players (Whitaker and Randolph) who racked up value on the field ahead of a player (Mazeroski), whom at the moment I think does better in a Keltner test, say. But even on WARP3 alone, Mazeroski scores more than Bob Johnson or Kirby Puckett. Which leads on to:

The third is that I think one needs to balance the spots on the ballot among the positions. I wouldn't have more than two from any one position on my ballot, but I think the lack of support for Mazeroski is so egregious that it demands I make some kind of protest.

Munson is another player whom I don't think gets any respect around here, at least in terms of votes. Must be something to do with the letter M.

I'm still working on my final ballot, trying to establish whether Whitaker or Winfield should be first. I've also made a few other changes, but you'll have to wait and see what they are.

Dave Righetti: Righetti always seemed frightfully human to me. Like he was always teetering a bit on an edge of anxiety. My clearest memory of him: he came into a game with men on and the Yanks ahead. The hitter promptly blasted one out to give the bad guys the lead. Rags got the new ball from the ump, turned, and fired it over the outfield fence in frustration. Does anyone remember which year this was or against what team? I thought it was Toronto, and I thought it was late in the year, but rsheet doesn't show any game that would fit the bill. I might be confusing the opponent with Toronto because Toronto may have been the team the Yanks were chasing. I remember it being a day game, but I'm not 100% sure.

It was in Toronto. I saw it live. He threw it over the right-centre gap fence with many feet to spare. It was in old Exhibition Stadium, so it then rolled the rest of the football field before coming to a stop.

I can't place the year, but it was obviously between 1984 and 1988, I'd say closer to 1988.

Dave Righetti: Righetti always seemed frightfully human to me. Like he was always teetering a bit on an edge of anxiety. My clearest memory of him: he came into a game with men on and the Yanks ahead. The hitter promptly blasted one out to give the bad guys the lead. Rags got the new ball from the ump, turned, and fired it over the outfield fence in frustration. Does anyone remember which year this was or against what team? I thought it was Toronto, and I thought it was late in the year, but rsheet doesn't show any game that would fit the bill. I might be confusing the opponent with Toronto because Toronto may have been the team the Yanks were chasing. I remember it being a day game, but I'm not 100% sure.

It was in Toronto. I saw it live. He threw it over the right-centre gap fence with many feet to spare. It was in old Exhibition Stadium, so it then rolled the rest of the football field before coming to a stop.

I can't place the year, but it was obviously between 1984 and 1988, I'd say closer to 1988.

If any of you is a gardener and can give me some advice about dwarf weeping flowering trees, I'd be much obliged. I have a chute-like space that's half-shade and that's begging for a 6-10' tall weeping flowering tree with a spread of less than three feet. But being a beginner, I don't have any clues about species that a Zone 5 guy could use. Just email to my primer address if you have any good suggestions. Thanks in advance!

Huh,
Thought I might get my ballot in this morning, but have run into the same "wow, not so easy to slot Winfield vs Whitaker vs maybe others" that my colleagues have found.
Go figure.
This needs a little more thought.

Howie, I have to agree with you and everyone. This ballot's a lot wierder than it seems at first inspection. There's 5000 different ways all these comparisons can run, particuarly if your voting history favored or didn't favor guys like Clemente, Wynn/Murphy, Fox, Randolph, Sisler, Keeler, etc.... Inconcistencies are bound to crop up on everyone's ballot.

A series of questions for the group.

1) Is Winfield manifestly better than Clemente or Keeler?
2) Is Clemente better than Keeler or vise verse?
3) Depending on your answer, does this change your view of any of these guys?

ronw, are you the one who keeps track of RonStars? RonStars being the All-Stars who are named to the team as the sole representative of their franchise and make only the one All-Star appearance. This was a pretty poor year for RonStars with only one qualifying player (or a pretty good year for the All-Star teams in general, depending on your point of view). Leyland needed to pick representatives from 4 teams but in picking Crawford, Jenks and Rios, he picked three players who are each going to their second game. His only RonStar selection is Gil Meche of the Kansas City Royals. LaRussa did even better. He needed to find representatives from 3 franchises and, like Leyland, was able to pick a couple of guys for their second appearance in Freddy Sanchez and Dmitri Young plus a guy making his sixth in Albert Pujols. You can certainly question some of LaRussa's other choices (Rowand? three extra closers for a total of six?) but he put together a team with 0 RonStars. Plus, as far as his questionable selections go, I think they make sense in terms of trying to win the game rather than in terms of rewarding the players with the best seasons so far- Rowand is one of the best defensive centerfielders and closers are more used to going hard for just one inning than started. I prefer the "rewarding the best players" route but with World Series home field advantage on the line, I can understand why LaRussa would go the other way.

1) Is Winfield manifestly better than Clemente or Keeler?
2) Is Clemente better than Keeler or vise verse?
3) Depending on your answer, does this change your view of any of these guys?

_If_ I don't adjust for context, these three players are quite similar in my system.

Clemente 434.05
Keeler 428.53
Winfield 424.88

But Keeler is over an in-out line of 400 for the 1890s, while Clemente's is 353 and Winfield's 348. So Clemente is better than Winfield by a little, and both are significantly better than Keeler, in context. And, really, I don't think Winfield is as close to Clemente as my system indicates. Clemente's career was cut short by his death, and he was still an excellent player when he died -- he was injured a lot, but he would surely have extended his career by a couple of good seasons. (He does have the advantage of some extra bulk early in his career--most teams not as bad as Pittsburgh would have seasoned Clemente in the minors, so it balances out somewhat.) Winfield's career, on the other hand, was extended significantly by the DH, as he was able to keep hitting for a long time after he was no longer able to play adequate defense. And career really is Winfield's strong suit. He'd still be a HoMer if the injury that caused him to miss his age 37 season had ended his career, but not by much.

Juan V. in "2001 Ballot"2-DAVE WINFIELD: I wonder if, in the future, he will become somewhat of an "anonymous Hall of Famer".

I believe so. He must now be one of the more "anonymous" members whose mlb careers overlapped with his own.

Neither Clemente nor Keeler will ever be among the more anonymous of his era.

Chris Cobb above:I don't think Winfield is as close to Clemente as my system indicates. Clemente's career was cut short by his death, and he was still an excellent player when he died -- he was injured a lot, but he would surely have extended his career by a couple of good seasons. (He does have the advantage of some extra bulk early in his career--most teams not as bad as Pittsburgh would have seasoned Clemente in the minors, so it balances out somewhat.)

Michael Schell, Baseball's All-Time Best Hitters (1999), presents and utilizes batting average with four adjustments. First is the "Longevity Adjustment" or "adjusting for late career declines" (ch 2). Essentially he truncates every career at 8000 atbats. Given the other three adjustments, only two players in mlb history lose more than 0.5 points (.0005) --representing late improvement in career average that gets discarded.

On the other hand, the top ten Gains by the adjustment are at least 7.2 points led by Murray, Wagner, and Yaz with +9.6 (.0096) points each --representing late decline in career average that gets discarded.

If I remember correctly, RonStar status is not permanent. Did anyone lose their RonStar status this year by being selected to their second game?

A more in-depth look:

<u>2nd- Time All-Stars</u>

NL Starters:
Chase Utley, David Wright and Jose Reyes are all making their second appearance. However, the same trio was voted into the starting line-up last year.

NL Pitchers:
Three pitchers are making their second appearance: Peavy, Penny and Francisco Cordero. Peavy was potentially a RonStar in '05 as he was San Diego's lone representative. Penny was not a RonStar as his teammate Nomar Garciaparra was also selected for the squad in '06. Cordero was also not a RonStar as three of his Texas teammates were named to the same team in '04.

NL Reserves:
A bunch of second-timers in the reserves: Brian McCann, Derrek Lee, Dmitri Young, Freddy Sanchez and Matt Holliday. McCann had two All-Star teammates in '06, Lee had one in '05 and both Sanchez and Holliday had one in '06. Dmitri Young had been a RonStar for the Detroit Tigers in 2003.

AL Starters:
Nobody is making their second appearance. Polanco is making his first; everybody else is making their fourth or higher.

AL Pitchers:
The three second-timers are all closers: Papelbon, K-Rod and Jenks. Papelbon had two All-Star teammates in '06 while Jenks had 6. K-Rod was joined by teammate Vladimir Guerrero back in '04.

AL Reserves:
A bunch of players are making their second appearance: Victor Martinez, Brian Roberts, Carlos Guillen, Carl Crawford, Torii Hunter, Alex Rios and Grady Sizemore. Sizemore had been a RonStar last year. Rios was not as four other Blue Jays were on that team. Torii Hunter was joined by a Twin teammate in '02, Guillen by a Tigers teammate in '04, Martinez by three teammates in '04 and Roberts by three teammates including two other infielders in '05. Carl Crawford had been a RonStar that same year.

As many as four players lose their RonStar status this year- Jake Peavy, Dmitri Young, Grady Sizemore and Carl Crawford- which more than offsets the one new RonStar, Gil Meche.

Since it has been brought up (Thanks again to Jeff M for the moniker), here are your RonStar rules:

For newer voters, RonStars are people who make the All-Star team (1) for the first time, (2) have no teammates named to the team, and (3) are not starting. As a broad generalization, these are players who are usually helped by the "one-per-team" rule, but not always. I usually wait until game day to distribute this list, because last minute roster changes can and do change RonStar status. As of this morning (before any replacements for Smoltz/A-Rod? are announced), there are only two potential RonStars for the 2007 All-Star Game:

As some examples, Bobby Jenks, and Brian Fuentes have no teammates in San Francisco, but they made the team before, so they can't be RonStars this year. Prince Fielder and Placido Polanco are a first-time All-Stars, but they are starting, so they don't qualify. Jose Valverde and Justin Morneau are also first-time All-Stars, and aren't starting, but they have teammates selected.

I like the "every team represented" rule, and always cheer for RonStars to get in the game, which keeps my interest going during a lopsided game in the late innings. I usually pick one favorite RonStar for each team. This year, I can't do that with both teams, but I'll be pulling for Meche and/or Haren to pitch an inning of relief.

One can lose permanent RonStar status by being selected again. Those who are no longer lifetime Ronstars include:

Dmitri Young (A RonStar in 2003 in Detroit, he is Washington's rep this year.)
Carl Crawford (2004 RonStar with the Devil Rays)
Jake Peavy (2005 RonStar with the Padres)
Grady Sizemore (2006 RonStar with the Indians)

Hall-of-Meriters and/or Hall-of-Famers who were once RonStars (but later lost that status):

Others of big reputation, you wonder whether their fans called them "perennial all-stars" at one time, and it's hard to believe they were honored only once - Dave Stewart, Don Baylor.

Vern Law was mainly before my time, with his last good year when I was first reading the Sunday statistics. He was not as good as I just learned but I'm surprised he didn't manage to get the call before or after 1960. In 1959, he was batting above .300 to May 3, slugging above .400 through the 22d, but he didn't keep it up. (9-5 at mid-season)

A long time ago in one of the discussion threads, I offered to post Mama Dr. Chaleeko's recipe for savory (not sweet) Kugel, and I didn't follow up. This was probably something like 25-50 elections ago.

It's been slowly gnawing at me every since that I hadn't posted it, and finally I bit the bullet and learned how to do the the btfwiki (with Sec. Murphy's assistance; thanks, John!). The recipe is now in the primates favorite recipes area and also linked from the entry for me that John set up in 2005.

I know you've all been waiting for this moment with baited breath. And now, finally, I can cross it off my to-do list. Bon appettite. Or more accurately mazeltof! (No, I can't spell in other langauges either.)

borrowed from Howie Menckel in the ballot thread: DAVE CONCEPCION - Peak is as good or better than Fox's; not quite as consistent, but a slick fielder and a very useful offensive weapon many times. Not fully buying the "other teams were stupid enough to play ciphers at the position" argument; that helped the Reds win pennants, but Concepcion can't get full credit for that stupidity. Similar case to Bancroft, whose prime I preferred this year to Concepcion's length.

I fully agree with the highlighted statement. I'm not a big fan of replacement-value arguments. I don't think that Concepcion is suddenly less valuable if Campaneris plays for the Giants instead of the A's or if Yount comes up with the Braves instead of the Brewers. And since so much of Concepcion's Hall of Fame case seemed to be "he was the best shortstop of the '70s" I was prepared to dismiss him out of hand.

But that was before I compared Concepcion to shortstops who were not his contemporaries. He doesn't have the one huge year that Rizzuto has in 1950. However, the length and quality of his prime are unmatched by eligible players at his position. His 1973 to 1982 are remarkable. In his career, he has 7 seasons with an OPS+ over 100. Plus OPS+ underrates Concepcion as it doesn't account for his excellent base-running or defense.

Concepcion is an excellent prime candidate, not because he compares well to a weak lot of contemporary shortstops, but because he compares well to the sizable backlog of a century's worth of shortstops.

To be clear, my replacement argument for Concepción is based on the overall depth of the SS position in the 1970's, not the distribution of shortstops between the AL and NL. Moreover, the presence of stars like Campaneris and Yount has no bearing on Concepción's value (besides their marginal impact on the overall league average level of offense and SS defense); it's the quality of replacement, freely available shortstops that determine his worth.

I am Concepción's biggest supporter, but without credit for the low replacement level and difficulty of domination of the 1970's I don't see how he beats out someone like Bancroft (whom I also back).

OK, I have to confess something. We were playing Stump the Schwab in IRC Friday night, and the category was "People inducted into the Hall of Fame since 1990". I had absolutely no excuse for not winning this - I could have done last year's Negro Leaguers until the cows came home. But I didn't want to go there unless I had to, because I felt it was showing off. So in the 5th round, I went with an executive (I even knew Bill Veeck and Leo Durocher were still available) who I was sure had made it in with a sympathy vote. Imagine my surprise when I learned Bart Giamatti wasn't in the Hall of Fame. (There are several executives I'd put in ahead of him - Miller & O'Malley come to mind - I just thought he was already there!)

Imagine my surprise when I learned Bart Giamatti wasn't in the Hall of Fame. (There are several executives I'd put in ahead of him - Miller & O'Malley come to mind - I just thought he was already there!)

I don't see him as having overwhelming credentials for the HOF, but he would still be better than Morgan Bulkeley and Effa Manley.

A little thing about Concepción (I don't want to clutter the ballot thread).

According to my estimates, the dark days of SS offense prevailed well after David's prime, pretty much until the arrival of the Holy Trinity (this is why Yount was #1 on my ballot when eligible, and Trammell, Ozzie, Ripken and Larkin are likely to follow suit). Since the drought was so long, I have a lot of trouble buying the "GMs were simply stupid to put all glove guys in the position".

I guess in 30 years, someone will assume that "there must have been a good reason," even though there isn't.

Or, there is a good reason, but you haven't thought of it yet.

We're presented with two possibilities. One of which is that we have 30 teams, filled with people whose livelihoods and careers are dependent upon victory, and all of these people are too stupid to see the obvious advantage in using their best reliever in a tie game.

The other possibility is that Howie Menckel is smarter than all those people.

Replacement level for SS was about 3.3-3.4 wins below overall non-DH league average in the 1950's, and returned there by the late 1980's. It was around 4.0 for most of the 1970's and the first half of the 1980's. Standard deviations were tighter in the 80's than the 70's, though, so the overall size of the adjustment to be made is pretty similar for 70's and 80's SS.

How long have managers been leaving their best relievers on the sidelines in tie games, saving them for a possible 3-run lead the next night?

Probably as long as they have been keeping their best reliever on the sideline to save for a 2 run lead in the 17th inning, while the three worst relievers pitch 4.2 innings (and one got an AB!). I demand everyone drop Willie Randolph 5 spots for his stupidity.

My humble suggestion: if someone posts something intended to cast dispersion on the project in general (not at a particular individual) in a mocking fashion, such as 2001 ballot #110:Do you remember when this project used to be fun? I do.
You want comments? Here goes...
1. Dave Winfield I consider him to be the most worthy player available.
2. Lou Whitaker I consider him to be the second most worthy player available.
etc
that a helpful response would be to wait for someone with responsibility toward guiding the project (commish, day-to-day manager, ballot committee if/when we get one) to reply appropriately. And possibly send them an email to suggest they do so. This would hopefully curtail potential mano-a-mano (or tag team) flame wars.

I would add that if person A slams B unfairly, it is incumbent on me (if I am "C", noticing this affront off to the side) to privately email A and ask him if he really meant what he said and to consider a public retraction; defending B, and taking the heat off of B to reply in kind and escalate. If I am "B", I'd wait a day for such to occur rather than attempting to defend myself. And if I was "A", I'd expect one of you to call me out privately and defend one of your cohorts.

I got a little lost in "A" and "B," but your idea leads me to this:
In the next such event, I email murphy or dimino and ask if I just read what I think I read, and can they intervene. Ideally, some sort of clarification/retraction/elaboration etc follows, and I can work with that.
If there's no progress in 24 hours, I probably still explain my strong sentiment, maybe it comes out a little differently.

Incidentally, it may be helpful to note Post 74 in the actual Ballot Thread.
An excerpt, after a question is raised to Murphy about enforcement of requiring comments..

"There is zero question of enforcement as long as I'm doing this job from now on. If anybody else wants to test my resolve, be my guest."

I will admit that the actual results of the comment policy are often kind of useless. But there are three good reasons for them that I can think of:

1)They provide a good requirement for people who want to start voting. We want voters to show they're taking this seriously. And it does feel basically unfair to require the new voters to go to such trouble and give others a pass.

2)I have found useful arguments in the comments at times. Some voters don't post much in the discussion threads but have intelligent things to say.

3)Sure, we could say that we know Rusty, he's a smart guy, he knows what he's doing, we trust him. And we'd be right to do so. But, ultimately, how can we defend that as being better than the BBWAA? They'll tell you that all of the voters take their job seriously and their opinions are worth counting. I'm sure it's true for a lot of voters, but I'm also sure that there's a significant portion who use criteria that they could never defend.

If we want our results to be taken seriously (which I think we all do to some extent), we need to be able to show that our voters were doing their jobs the right way, were using valid criteria to judge the players, and weren't leaving people out for no good reason. That's what the point of the ballot comments is.

And if we're going to be completely honest about this - yes, the comments can certainly be an exercise in BS that don't really form a coherent argument. (I include mine here - some are legitimately useful, some just sort of sound good, and some still have lines from my 1934 ballot included.) But on the other hand, if you just cut and paste them and remove any glaring references, nobody says anything about it, and it is not really that much of a hassle. It's not that huge of a burden.